“The sport has never been more popular with TV audiences at a ten-year high and the BBC has always stated its commitment to the big national sporting moments.

“With this new deal not only have we delivered significant savings but we have also ensured that through our live and extended highlights coverage all the action continues to be available to licence-fee payers.”

Barney Francis, the managing director of Sky Sports, said: “This is fantastic news for F1 fans and Sky Sports will be the only place to follow every race live and in HD.

“We will give F1 the full Sky Sports treatment with a commitment to each race never seen before on UK television.”

Sky passed a target of achieving ten million customers in the UK last November, however many of these will not have the Sky Sports package.

Are you happy with the new arrangement? Will this change how you watch F1 next year? Have your say in the comments.

443 comments on Sky and BBC to share UK F1 coverage from 2012

Half the issue lies with the budget constraints the BBC now faces, and with the freezing of the license fee, that gives them even less headroom for live sport. Why the hell couldn’t they get rid of BBC Three for one, eh?

Anyway, the way I see it is that most of the faraway races, which unfortunately include Japan, Canada and Brazil, will not be live on the BBC. They will most likely do live in Europe, where it’s more ‘value for money’

Adam Cooper said they’ll show the final race of the season in Brazil. I’m guessing they will actually show the Americas races (Canada, US) because they will fit nicely in UK primetime. The Asia races (except Singapore) will be badly affected, though.

I do have to wonder how this will influence the contracts they have with channels in other countries – part of those are just “show UK public channel”, others have bought specifically F1, and for some the lack of F1 will degrade the value of getting BBC.

I lobbied my cable operator to get BBC HD, but I can now tell them thanks but don’t bother after this year, it’s not worth the high price.

This will reduce costs, but I think it is more that no one in BBC management cares about, not nearly enough as they do about those old grumps who complained the Canada GP went too long and delayed a non-live show.

I will now be pirating every race that is not covered by BBC. It makes no sense for half the races to be free to watch, and the other half to be paid to watch. Makes utterly no sense. BBC have been doing an outstanding job. Surprised they needed to make such a drastic budget cut with record breaking viewers.

I assume that the teams (and their sponsors) have been involved in this. And I sort of expect that they looked at it as “Loose four or five million viewers in the UK, gain 40 or 50 million in India and China . . .”
I think it’s a poor argument as consumer affluence and spending power is much higher in the UK, but maybe that’s not their point.
Even though I have Sky Sports (mainly because I live in a ‘difficult’ area with virtually no aerial reception), I will object to paying to watch races and having to pay to watch the blasted advertising at the same time. This is going to damage the UK market enormously. And if News Corp manages to buy the F1 rights from CVC, it’ll be game over.

Unbelievable, One of the worlds biggest sports gets a bits and pieces TV deal like this???
This is the kind of deal the IndyCar series made because they’re struggling for cash and viewers.
Not Formula One please!

I dread to think how this will affect our already minimal Aussie TV coverage…
Thanks for completely spoiling my weekend to whoever is responsible for this terrible idea..

‘The BBC and Sky Sports will broadcast Formula 1 in the UK between 2012 and 2018 under a new rights deal. The BBC has been the exclusive broadcaster of F1 in the UK since 2009 but its contract with Formula One Management was due to expire after the 2013 season. ‘
– translation = ‘BBC have given up their exclusive right to 2012 coverage – and fans lose a year of free to air, but at least we can pay lip service to a small number of our licence fee payers. The majority don;t care and want us to focus on utter drivel sit-coms with tin-pot British thesps.

and Barbara Slater, director of BBC Sport, said: “We are absolutely delighted that F1 will remain on the BBC.
– translation = ‘we’re off the hook for the production costs and can stop slashing wages back at the office’

Barney Francis, managing director of Sky Sports, said: “This is fantastic news for F1 fans and Sky Sports will be the only place to follow every race live and in HD.
– Translation = ‘if I say this with enough conviction and a bit of a smile, maybe they’ll believe me.’

“We will give F1 the full Sky Sports treatment with a commitment to each race never seen before on UK television.”
– Translation = ‘screw the fans for everything they’ve got’

I cannot believe anyone thought his was a good decision! Us diehard fans want to watch practice, qually, and not only every race in full but also the great pre-race info and interviews plus the brilliant F1 forum provided by the BBC.

Jake, Eddie, DC, and Martin are well respected in the paddock and get interviews that other presenters cannot. Tthink of Eddie grabbing Stefano Domenicali after the ‘team orders’ fiasco last year and the brilliant fun on the forum after the Monaco race this year (it makes me laugh just thinking about Eddie being repeatedly pushed into the pool in the Red Bull boat!!).

Also will Martin’s excellent grid walks be stopped or maybe he can still do these and they could be shown on the ‘highlights’ show. I love the way he completely understands and respects the drivers preparing for the race yet still gets great interviews.

Can Sky really live up to all this? I don’t think so but will never know as I don’t subscribe to Sky.

This is a sad day for F1 fans. We may buy tickets for races at extortinate prices and pay Â£40 for team t-shirts but ultimately our thoughts and opinions count for nothing.

Bernie you money grabbing little sellout. F1 is on the crest of a wave with great races, British drivers doing well, and great BBC coverage free to all. This will bring it crashing down to where it used to be. Disgraceful.